Too Serious A Matter
by stonecoldfox
Summary: A new nurse, fresh from the USA, arrives at the 4077th clutching the wounded body of a korean chid. (Chapter one formatting now fixed)
1. Chapter One

Disclaimer: I don't own any of the characters or setting herein.

"War is too serious a matter to entrust to military men." Georges Clemenceau

For two days, Colonel Potter and the staff of the 4077th had been anticipating the overdue arrival of three much-needed new nurses - two from Tokyo General, one straight from her residency in Milton Memorial Hospital, New Hampshire. A week earlier, when a clerical error from I-corps forced Potter to send two of his nursing staff home to the states very suddenly and one to another assignment, the MASH unit he commanded suddenly found themselves very short-staffed and, over the course of several days of heavy-duty operating, very short-tempered.

On the second day, after having been given the run-around from I-corps regarding whether or not the three nurses who were to have arrived at 1600 hours the previous day had actually been sent yet, the Colonel's nerves were, not surprisingly, beginning to fray at the edges.

"Radar!" he boomed from his office.

"Yes sir?" Corporal O'Reilly said nervously, poking his head in the door.

"Any word yet?"

"Uh, I'm working on it sir, but things are kinda busy on their end, but just as soon as-"

"Things are kinda busy on our end too, Radar! In case you hadn't noticed, I'm up to my tonsils in wounded boys! Now get back on that phone and get me some nurses!"

"Yes sir, I will sir, but they've already told me-"

"NOW, Radar!"

"Yes sir, Colonel, right away."


	2. Chapter Two

At eleven pm on the third night, when Radar was just about on the verge of a nervous breakdown and the Colonel had become convinced of the very worst, a young woman came stumbling into camp, covered in blood, clutching the body of a very small Korean child in her arms.

"Help! Somebody help! Wounded child!" she yelled hoarsely, gulping for air between words. Her throat was dry and the words came out barely above a loud whisper.

"Who goes there?" demanded Klinger, coming out of the shadows wearing a dress and pointing a rifle.

"Help!" she yelled again, her voice becoming stronger. "This child is wounded, he needs a doctor!"

"Oh my god," said Klinger, dropping the gun and running to her aid. Together they lowered the boy to the ground. "Stay here, I'll get Captain Pierce. Don't worry, he's the best in Korea." With a pat on the girl's shoulder, he ran off to the swamp.

"Hawkeye! Hawkeye, get up!" Klinger entered the doctor's tent and shook him roughly.

"What?" Hawkeye mumbled, swatting randomly at Klinger's face. "No, go away. It's not the end of the war yet."

"We got a wounded kid out here!"

That got his attention. He sat up and rubbed his face, then fumbled around for his pants. "What? Who? A local?"

"No, my neighbour's kid in Toledo," Klinger quipped, but there was no humour in his voice. "Of course, a local! I think he's hurt pretty bad."

"Thanks Doc," Hawkeye said as he pulled on his boots. BJ stirred in his sleep.

"Will you keep it down? Some of us have to work in the morning."

"And some of us have to work now. Up, Beej. We got a customer. Wounded kid in camp," Hawkeye said, now throwing BJ's pants onto his bed before heading for the door.

BJ sat up abruptly as Hawkeye left. "A kid?" he asked, frowning at Klinger.

"Yeah, real small one too. He came in with a girl; I don't know where the hell they've been but they look terrible."

BJ threw his clothes on and both he and Klinger ran out the door.


	3. Chapter Three

"Finally!" the young woman barked as Hawkeye arrived on the scene. She cradled the boy's head in her hands, not wanting to hurt him any further on the rough ground. "You the doctor?"

"That's me," Hawkeye said distractedly, pulling at the boy's shirt to get a look at his injuries. "What happened?"

"Landmine, I think. His leg's hurt pretty bad too. I bandaged him up as best I could but I couldn't stop the bleeding altogether."

"You did a good job," Hawkeye said, looking up at her for the first time. He frowned as he noticed the blood all over her shirt and neck. "Are you injured?"

"Nothing serious. The blood's mostly his," she said with a worried look at the boy. Her voice was steely and resolute as she spoke, but Hawkeye couldn't help but notice her shaking hands and white face.

"Don't worry, he'll pull through," he assured her, then yelled, "BJ!"

BJ arrived and Klinger quickly followed, having found a stretcher and Colonel Potter on their way. The Colonel looked on the scene as he arrived and for a brief moment stopped, just staring at what lay before him. Of all the lousy rotten things to happen in this war, he thought to himself, surely the worst must be innocent bystanders like this tiny kid getting ripped apart. God, he looked about two years old. Colonel Potter looked up at BJ then, and as their eyes met he knew the younger man must be thinking the same thing.

"Alright, let's get this kid into OR," Hawkeye said sharply. Klinger took one end of the stretcher and BJ the other; they lifted the boy easily - he was so light. "Gently, Klinger, for crying out loud!"

"Sorry Captain, I guess I don't know my own strength," Klinger said, cringing. BJ, Klinger, and the boy on the stretcher disappeared into the OR. Hawkeye hesitated, turning back to Colonel Potter.

"Colonel, would you take a look at her? She may be in shock," Hawkeye said quietly, with an appraising glance at the young woman who brought in their patient.

"On it, son," Colonel Potter replied swiftly, and turned his attention to the girl who was now trying to stand up. "Easy, easy," he said, giving her a hand.

"We need a nurse," Hawkeye said, but as soon as the words left his mouth Radar was almost at his side, having been woken up by the commotion outside his quarters. Already he was in action, knowing his part in the circus by heart.

"I'll get Major Houlihan," he said, and took off running to her tent.

Hawkeye took a deep breath and went quickly to scrub up. That poor little kid, he thought. This damn ugly war just keeps getting uglier.


	4. Chapter Four

"That should do the trick," Colonel Potter said kindly, finishing up a bandage on the young woman's ankle. "Just a sprain. You keep that rested for a few days. As for that nasty bruise on your ribs and the scrape on your neck, they should clear up in a week or so. Painful, I know, but at least it's not permanent."

"Thank you sir," she said, wincing as she slid off his desk.

"Now, why don't you take that seat, and this drink," he said, sitting a glass of whisky on the desk in front of her. "And tell me what happened. You look like you've been through hell and back."

There was a long silence. The girl opened her mouth but closed it again quickly.

"Why don't we start with your name?" Potter asked gently.

The girl looked around at the walls for a minute. She shifted in her seat nervously. "Sir, is this the 4077th?"

"You bet. Best Care Anywhere; at least that's what the sign says."

"I'm Lieutenant Amy Clark, Colonel Potter. I'm your new nurse."

Colonel Potter sat forward in his seat and crossed his arms on top of the desk. He stared at her intently for a moment. "New nurse? Singular? That's supposed to be nurses."

"Yes sir, it is supposed to be," she said, biting the inside of her lip and frowning as she stared into her glass.

"And my new nurses, plural, were supposed to arrive on Tuesday at 1600 hours, not on Thursday at 2300 hours. What happened?"

Amy swallowed and continued to stare into her untouched whisky. A couple of times she opened her mouth, but no words came out. All of a sudden, she lifted her glass and downed the whole lot. When she lowered it again, there were tears in her eyes but her jaw was set.

"We didn't make it," she said hoarsely.


	5. Chapter Five

"Says they never even got a warning. Hit number one, boom - the jeep went up in flames with the driver and two of our nurses in it. Either somebody's a very good shot or the Chinese got real lucky. Amy says they'd stopped by the side of the road because she was carsick. She walks ten yards, throws up, turns back and the jeep is just a burning black skeleton."

Hawkeye, BJ and Margaret sat in Colonel Potter's office, taking his story in. The operation on the Korean boy had been a success, but nobody felt much like celebrating.

"That poor girl," Margaret said. "She must feel awful."

"Hit the nail on the head, Major. But that's not the whole story. She's out in the middle of nowhere, no help to be found, radio burnt to a crisp, so she decides to walk the rest of the way to camp and maybe find help on the way. Instead she gets lost and finds a North Korean foot patrol about three miles up the road. The kid had to hide up a tree while they went past, but wouldn't you know it - they decided to camp out for the night."

"Let me guess," BJ said ruefully. "Right under her tree?"

"Right underneath."

"Oh my god," Margaret said, clamping a hand to her mouth.

BJ inhaled deeply. "It's lucky the human brain rarely thinks to look above eye level, or she'd be dead now."

"Or worse," Hawkeye added, grimacing.

"What about the boy, Colonel? Where'd she find him?" BJ asked.

"Minefield a few miles from here," Colonel Potter said grimly. "Says he was like that when she found him, so god knows how long he'd lay there bleeding."

"She pulled him out of a minefield?"

"Well, she didn't realise it was minefield at the time. Took her four and a half hours to get him here, and she carried him all the way with a sprained ankle."

Hawkeye frowned. "How'd she sprain her ankle?"

"She can't remember," said Colonel Potter, shaking his head. "I've had Radar put her up in VIP quarters for tonight. I don't think she'd be up to meeting any new roommates just yet. Margaret, I'd like you to have a chat to her tomorrow. Let her know what to expect around here when wounded start pouring in."

"Of course, Colonel."

BJ frowned. "Colonel, do you think it's a good idea to throw her into it straight away? Maybe we should give her a few days to collect herself."

"No, I think it's best that she get into the swing of things straight away. A sense of normalcy will help."

"And what could be more normal than this place?" Hawkeye said.


	6. Chapter Six

"There you go, Lieutenant, you're all set," Radar said, wiping dust off the desk in the VIP tent. It had been a few weeks since any Very Important People had visited the 4077th.

"Thank you Corporal O'Reilly," Amy said, smiling wanly. He reminded her of her next-door neighbour back home; he had a kind of cheerfulness about him that she found very comforting.

"Oh, you can call me Radar, everyone does."

"Cute nickname. What's it for?"

Radar blushed. "Uh well, sometimes I know things are gonna happen 'fore they happen."

"Really? Wow. I wish a had ESP."

"Oh, I don't know about that, I just sense things other people don't, I guess."

Amy smiled again. She couldn't quite bring herself to laugh yet, though she knew that under ordinary circumstances Radar was exactly the kind of person she would find amusing. "Well, thanks for your help, Radar."

"You're welcome Lieutenant. Goodnight."

Radar exited the tent, still blushing and smiling to himself. As he began to walk towards his office, he passed Major Houlihan.

"Radar, did you just come from the VIP tent?"

"Yes Major, straightaway, just then."

"Well, how is she? Is Lieutenant Clark still awake?"

"Yes ma'am but I wouldn't -"

"Don't tell me what you wouldn't, Corporal, I don't care what you wouldn't." Margaret said, her temper rising.

"No ma'am, I mean yes ma'am, but the Colonel said -"

"Oh, get out of my way, you idiot!"

"Yes ma'am."

………….

Amy heard the conversation outside and quickly switched off her light. She couldn't talk to anybody else tonight, it was just too much to take in. She lay there in the dark, eyes wide open, feeling a little guilty but pretending to be asleep. There came a knock at the door.

"Lieutenant Clark?" a female voice called. "I'm Major Houlihan. May I come in for a minute?"

Amy lay quiet and still. If she just stayed quiet…

"Amy? I'd like to speak with you if you'll let me in." The voice was unmistakeably stern, but quite kind at the same time. Amy turned over in bed and considered, for a brief moment, letting the Major in. She hesitated.

"Alright, I understand if you need some more time. But I'll be by again in the morning to see you, alright?" There came no answer. Major Houlihan looked down; there was sadness in her eyes for this young woman who'd been through so much already just to get here… But the Head Nurse in her couldn't help wondering how Clark would be when she had to deal with hundreds of wounded men. Would she fall apart?

"Goodnight Lieutenant," she said quietly, and began walking away.

"Goodnight Major," came the soft reply. Margaret smiled into the dark.


End file.
